


Wish You Were Here

by vienn_peridot



Series: Angelus Primus [3]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Angel!Ratchet, Angst, Drunkenness, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Grief/Mourning, Hints of Dratchet, Other, Primus is a meddler
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-07
Updated: 2015-11-07
Packaged: 2018-04-30 10:36:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5160623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vienn_peridot/pseuds/vienn_peridot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone needs a shoulder sometimes.<br/>Even Primes and Matrix-bearers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wish You Were Here

**Author's Note:**

> Recommended Listening:  
> Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd, Jillian - Within Temptation, Soviets - The Boxer Rebellion, The Persistance of Loss - Nine Inch Nails
> 
> Disclaimer: I haven't read all of the IDW-Generation 1 comics. My information about the destruction of Nyon comes from the TFWiki

Primus’ presence in his spark had been nagging at Ratchet for _weeks_.

Every time he requested –or demanded- an explanation for the incessant pestering all he got was the image of a certain red-and-gold Matrix bearer and a vague sense of worry.

It wasn’t even appeased by their weekly business meetings that consisted less of business and more of just… hanging out, really.

Now Primus was exerting constant pressure and a sense of urgency that had finally driven Ratchet to do what he’d never done before and seek Rodimus out. Of his own volition. During his precious off-time. Because for some reason the annoying little fragger wasn’t answering comms. According to the current timetable the Captain should just be finishing his duty shift, which could explain the lack of an answer.

_This had better be important_ , Ratchet groused at the worry-wart whose presence he could feel hovering close, _I’m missing Games Night and I’m_ not _happy about it!_

All that came back was an increase in pressure that made the medic growl and walk faster. It was shift change so _if_ he was lucky he could catch Rodimus leaving the bridge.

Given the roster and the annoying presence in his spark Ratchet was completely unprepared to see the distinctive silhouette of Drift standing next to the command chair with Ultra Magnus leaving the bridge, obviously having just handed over command to the 3IC. Since Magnus was facing towards Ratchet he was the first one to notice him standing just inside the door, probably looking confused as all Pit.

“May I help you, Ratchet?” Ultra Magnus asked politely, raising an optical ridge. He was obviously just as confused by the situation as Ratchet.

_Well usually I don’t come all the way up here unless I’ve been paged_.

The instant Ratchet’s designation left Magnus’ mouth Drift was whipping around, his faceplates full of uncertainty that became a cautious, hopeful smile a moment later when he saw the CMO was actually there.

“What’re you doing here, Ratchet? You’re supposed to be a Games Night.” That same hope filtered into Drift’s voice and Ratchet hated to kill it, but he was looking for a different speedster.

_Sorry, kid._

“I’m looking for Rodimus. Do either of you know where he is?”

Drift’s happy expression vanished as he’d known it would and the speedster looked away, fiddling with his armour.

“He’s meditating with the Matrix, trying to figure out the next part of our course.” The swordsmech said. “Rodimus said he used to get visions when he was carrying the Matrix and he was hoping that another one might pop up, or something.”

It was too much effort to deal with the nagging in his spark and resist the urge to roll his optics at the same time so Ratchet went ahead and rolled them, allowing himself the indulgence of making a snorting sound with his vents at the same time.

Strangely, it was Ultra Magnus who came charging to Rodimus’ defence.

“It is not uncommon for Matrix Bearers to experience visions brought on by close association with the artefact.” His expression was even more stern than usual and Ratchet wondered what the frag was going on.

“So he’s in his quarters, right?” Ratchet turned on his pede, ready to leave the situation that was threatening to become intolerably awkward.

“Wait, you can’t just interrupt him!” Drift’s voice was urgent enough to stop Ratchet in his tracks.

“And why the slag not?” He demanded, not bothering to turn around.

“B-because a Matrix meditation is a sacred ritual.”

The glyphs were delivered in an utterly sincere tone and Ratchet honestly couldn’t tell if Drift was being serious or just talking rubbish to get a reaction out of him. Ultra Magnus was no help; he had slipped past Ratchet was already halfway out the door, leaving Ratchet in the lurch.

“I don’t care. He can restart it when he tells me why I get an urgent conversation request and then he goes and _shuts off his fragging comms_.” Ratchet snarled, easily conflating two of the major nuisances in his life into the one sentence so Drift could draw whatever conclusions he liked.

“Oh.” The speedster sounded subdued. “Well, if that’s the case then I-”

“Should stay on the bridge and wait for the CMO to give you the all-clear.” Ratchet interrupted, wanting to be done with the whole situation. “I’ll be in touch.”

He stomped out without waiting to hear if Drift said anything, heading straight for Rodimus’ quarters. It was a relatively short trip, even without cheating by using his altmode. Ratchet used the walk to vent as much of his frustration with Primus and life in general as he could. By the time he reached Rodimus’ quarters he was still fuming but no longer on the verge of snapping at anyone who spoke to him.

Despite Ratchet doing what he was clearly supposed to be doing, Primus’ presence in his spark was _still_ agitated and Ratchet dearly wished that for cone the deity would just sod off and stop meddling. He sighed and pressed the entry request chimer.

Rodimus ignored it.

And the next one.

And all of his polite requests for entry.

The increasingly impolite ones all got a similar lack of response.

Eventually Ratchet gave up and entered his medical override, walking into the one of the last scenes in the universe he expected to find.

Stuffing was spread across the floor in a long arc, leading to the scorched and eviscerated remains of a pillow. The cover of the appalling amorphous furniture-beast Rodimus called a couch bore a few burn marks as well but it appeared to be otherwise unscathed. In fact, the longer Ratchet looked the more it seemed as if that pillow had been the only casualty.

Until his optics fell on Rodimus.

The speedster was sitting slumped against the wall; one arm was braced across his knees, holding a mostly-empty bottle. Even from this distance Ratchet recognised the contents of the bottle as being some of the strongest engex known to Cybertronian kind and a shiver went up his backstruts. Rodimus was resting his helm on the flame jets of the arm holding the bottle while the other punched the floor in a rhythm that was completely out-of-time with the uneven hiccupping of his vents.

Every line of his frame was set in abject misery, an emotion Ratchet hadn’t thought Rodimus even knew _existed_ let alone felt so strongly his plating hung slack and his spoiler drooped from his back as if the living metal was too heavy to hold up.

“Rodimus?”

The mech didn’t even look up; just mumbled something that sounded like a very slurred ‘go away’ into the metal of his arm.

“Not happening.”

Rodimus gave no signs that he’d heard so Ratchet picked his way across the room, avoiding the remains of the pillow as he did.

_I’m not picking that garbage out of my pedes tonight._

A familiar strain and itch spread across his backpanels as he encountered the edge of Rodimus’ EM Field. It was a vile mess of guilt, self-loathing and grief that was almost impossible to connect with the cheerful, vibrant mech the speedster usually was. Sure, the younger mech was often impulsive, sometimes arrogant and didn’t think things through often enough, but Ratchet couldn’t think of anything that could possibly cause the noxious emotional haze he waded through to finally settle his tired frame against the wall beside Rodimus.

“What’s up?”

_Stupid question, but it’s the best place to start._

Rodimus raised his helm and glared.

“Tol’ you t’ go ‘way.” The speedster slurred, raising the engex bottle to his mouth.

Before he could swallow any more of the stuff Ratchet plucked the bottle from Rodimus’ slack grip, neatly whisking it out of reach when the Captain made a clumsy grab for it.

“No more of that for you, I think.” Ratchet’s gentle tone took some edge off the sharp glyphchoice. “And I can’t exactly go away. So, what’s up?”

Rodimus gave him a hard, bitter stare.

“Check th’ date.” His voice and Field went flat and hostile. “I’m th’ _only_ one who doesn’ need t’ think about it t’ remember.”

It took far longer than Ratchet liked for him to draw a connection between that day’s date and one of the cruellest events of the early war.

_Oh Primus, it’s_ today _. It’s the anniversary of…_

When his realisation percolated out into his Field Ratchet felt the mech beside him crumple into near-silent sobs. His spark sank and he extended both his EMF and an arm in silent support, offering what comfort he could in the face of the younger mech’s grief.

Moments later his arm was around Rodimus’ shoulders as the speedster shifted to curl against Ratchet’s side, shuddering violently. Ratchet slid his arm under the drooping spoiler winglets and pulled the mech firmly into the reinforced armour of his side. Tears dripped onto the glass of his chest and Rodimus’ sticky cheekplate pressed against the cooler surface. The volume of his hitching gasps and the whine of stressed systems increased steadily, the mech obviously too upset to keen out his grief.

“I want them back, Ratchet.” Rodimus gasped brokenly, vents heaving in uneven cycles. “I want them _back_.”

“I know, kid. I know.”

There wasn’t anything else he _could_ say. This was neither the time nor place for platitudes and Ratchet refused to mock the younger mech’s pain by using them. Instead he let Rodimus grieve. At one point the speedster reached across Ratchet’s frame for something, possibly the engex bottle or maybe he was just looking for something to hold on to, because when Ratchet intercepted the searching hand with his own Rodimus intertwined their fingers and held on tightly.

It took a long, long time but Rodimus eventually reached the end of his tears. Neither of them moved while the speedsters uneven ventilations slowly stabilised again. Ratchet continued to provide silent support, wondering when Rodimus would become self-conscious enough to pull away.

“Do you think they hate me?”

Rodimus’ question came out of nowhere, spoken in a small, static-laden voice to the glass over Ratchet’s sparkchamber.

Ratchet didn’t need to ask for an explanation, the needed information simply unfurling within his Spark as it did when Primus was feeling helpful.

“No, I wouldn’t say so.”

It seemed to be too much for Rodimus to comprehend.

“But I _killed_ them, Ratch!” He pulled away and stared at the medic, the fuzz of inebriation nowhere near as strong as it had been when Ratchet found him. “ _All_ of them! I didn’t even give them a choice, just pulled the switch and…” He let go of Ratchet’s hand and made an exploding motion with his gold-plated fingers. “Boom. Gone. Everyone, _gone_. Just like that.”

“You gave them mercy, Rodimus.” The helpful flowering of knowledge was gone and Ratchet struggled to find the glyphs to express what Primus had given him to tell. “Yes, you killed them but you saved them from a worse fate. No plan is perfect; some of them would have known what was happening even before the Destructors were loosed. A swift death is infinitely preferable to the suffering that Zeta had planned for them.”

“Could have found another way.” The speedster insisted, pulling away, hauling his knees up and hugging them to his chest. “If I’d just been _better_ , been _faster_ we could have saved more. Could have gotten everyone out. Nobody else would have had to die…”

_…Because of me_. The unspoken words hung in the air between them.

Ratchet was many things but he wasn’t brave enough to face that. Not here, not now. He suspected that Rodimus wasn’t, either.

_He really needs to talk to Rung about this, but it would take more firepower than we have on board to get Rodimus into that office._

“Hindsight is always perfect and we _aren’t_. No mech is.” Ratchet said, putting a hand on Rodimus’ backplates. “It sucks slag but that’s how it is, Speed Racer. You can’t save everyone all the time.”

Ratchet’s own guilt over patients not saved made his EMF heavy and Rodimus sighed, uncurling from his huddle just enough to cock a tired optical ridge at the older mech.

“You’re not very comforting, you know that?”

Ratchet snorted, noting with a sense of relief how the speedster’s spoiler had lifted ever so slightly from its unhappy droop.

It wasn’t much, but it was an improvement.

“If you want pretty words I’m not your mech.” Ratchet said dryly. “I’m a medic, not a poet.”

Tired blue optics flickered as Rodimus nodded his agreement with that statement. Ratchet sighed and stood up, holding out a hand to his captain.

“Come on, it’s the middle of the night and you look absolutely wrecked. Let’s get you into bed.”

“Taking advantage of my vulnerable state to proposition me?” The teasing fell flat, Rodimus not even cracking a smile as he took the proffered hand and let the medic haul him to his pedes. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“Shut up, brat. You know I don’t swing that way.” Ratchet was forced to slide an arm around Rodimus’ waist as the speedster stumbled, either still drunk or far more tired than he sounded.

“Won’t stop me teasing you, though.”

“I’ve dealt with worse.”

It was a short walk to Rodimus’ berthroom and Ratchet helped the younger mech to the berth before he let him go, watching Rodimus collapse onto the padded surface of his berth and burrow uncoordinatedly under the tough thermal covers. After some shuffling the speedster managed to create a rough cocoon around himself that came dangerously close to being cute. Ratchet said goodnight to the lump on the berth and was about to leave when Rodimus popped his helm out of the blankets in a way that appeared to defy the laws of physics.

“Can… can you stay?” He asked plaintively, turning big, sad optics on the medic. “I don’t want to be by myself right now.”

It took all of half a minute for Ratchet to decide. Half a minute of pleading optics and Field and that blasted _pressure_ returning to bear down on his spark again.

“Fine.”

Rodimus wiggled over to make room and Ratchet laid face-down on the free strip of berth, resting his helm on his crossed arms. Almost as an afterthought he released his wings from their tight confinement at his back. One hung off the berth and rested on the floor, the other spread out over the speedster who had shuffled over to press his blanket-swathed backplates against Ratchet’s side.

“’Night Ratchet.”

“Pleasant recharge, Rodimus.”

As he powered down for recharge Ratchet thought he heard a whispered ‘thank you’, but couldn’t work out if it came from the mech beside him or the presence in his spark. Figuring it out didn’t really matter right now; it was all the same to him in the end.

_With any luck, neither of us will have any nightmares._

Something agreed, and Ratchet followed the speedster into sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes Ratchet forgot to contact Drift.  
> Drift didn't comm Ratchet because Drift is sulking.
> 
> This got a lot more personal than I intended. Sorry about the clunky.


End file.
